nicolopicus7

[small frost]

Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

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Make it descriptive, including relevant context, but also to the point. This way you improve your chances of getting a more relevant and specific answer.

[karmic flax]

the verb is "se rendre compte"

it's a pronominal verb, so it works a bit like “to render oneself account”

"vous vous rendez compte" thus works as “you render yourself account”

this will help if you're not familiar with pronominal verbs

https://www.lawlessfrench.com/grammar/pronominal-verbs/

[dense harness]

is this different from reflexive verbs? not seen them called this before

[jolly hare]

they're the same, really
some would argue reflexive verbs are just part of the family of pronominal verbs

[karmic flax]

yeah afaik reflexive verbs imply an action done to oneself, like "se laver"?

but the "se rendre compte" type is kind of like that, just less transparent

[south knot]

english to french courses tend to call them reflexive
french refers to them as pronominal

iirc reflexive verbs are a more general grammatical/linguistic term, so i prefer the pronominal label regardless of language, but you'll often seen both used interchangeably to describe them in english

[dense harness]

is vous vous rendez compte a common way to say 'do you realise?'

[south knot]

yes.

if the context has already mentioned, i'd add an en: vous vous en rendez compte?

if not: vous vous rendez compte de la différence?

[dense harness]

wow alright, thank you all

[maiden vigil]

you can just search expressions in a good dictionary
https://www.wordreference.com/fren/se rendre compte de